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About The Sioux County journal. (Harrison, Nebraska) 1888-1899 | View Entire Issue (March 8, 1894)
't , ind;mi,.iiii The Sioux County Journal, VOLUME VI. HAKKLSOX, NEBRASKA, THURSDAY, .MARCH 8, 1894. NUMBER 26. TALMAGE'S SERMON. DISCOURSE ON THE LIGHT NINQ OF THE SKA. In Coa.nally Attractive and Eloquent Ser mon The I'.thvi.y of the Almighty An Irradlstd Ware of UUdntu-Tlia Glow of Good leed. A Path That Shine In the Hrooklyn Tabernaole last Sun flay Key. Dr. Talmajfe preached an un umially attractive and eloquent KOnel lermon to a crowded audience. The ! ubject was "The Lightning of the Sea," the txt wlected beinff Job xli, 32, "He maketh a path to ohino after Him." If for the next tiouHand years min Utem of religion should preach from this Bible, there will yet be texts un exKunded and unexplained and unap preciated. What little has been said concerning' this chapter in Job from which my text is taken bears on the controversy as to what was really the leviathan described us disturbing the tea. What creature it was I know not. Borne say it was a whalo. Some say it was a crocodile. My own opinion is it was a sea monster now extinct. No creature now floating in Mediterranean or Atlantic waters corresponds U Job's description. Lightning of the Kea. What most interests rae is that as it moved on through the deep it left the waters liaUinjf and resplendent. In the words of the text, 'lie maketh a path to shine after him." What was that Illumined path? It was phosphor escence. You find it in the wake of a ship in the night, especially after rough weather. Phosphorescence is the lightning of the sea. That this figure of sHjech is correct in desvrib inif its appearance I am certified by an incident. After crossing the Atlantic the first time and writing from Hasle. Switzerland, to an American magazine an account of my voyage,' in which nothing' more fascinated tue than the phosphorescence in the ship s wake, I called it the lijfhtninir of the sea. Re turning to my hotel, I found a book of John Htiskin, and the llrst sentence my eyes fell upon wm his description of phosphorescence, in which ho called it "tho lightning of the sea." Down to tho postotllce 1 hastened to get the manuscript and with great lalor and some expense jfot possession of the lnana.ine article and put quota tion marks around that one sentence, although it was as original with me as with John Kuskiti. 1 suppose that nino tenthsof you living so near the sea coast have watched this marine ap- tiearanco called phosporoseence, and I opo that the other one-tenth may some day bo so happy as to witnoss it. it is the waves of the sea diamonded; it Is the inflorescence of tho billows; tho waves of the sea crimsoned as was the deep after the sea light of Le panto; the waves of tho sea on fire. There are times when from horizon to horizon the entire oceuu seems in conflagration with this strange splendor as it changes e'.ery moment to tamer or more da..ling color on all sides of you. You sit looking over the tailrail of the yacht or ocean steamer, watch ing anu waiting to see what new thing the God of lxiauty will do with the At lantic. It is the oecun in transfigura tion; it is the murine world casting its garments of glory in the pathway of tho Almighty in he walks the deep; it is an inverted firmament with ail its stars gone down with it. No picture can present it, for photographer's cam era cannot le successfully trained to catch it,, and before it tho hand of the painter dro its pencil, overawed and powerless. This phosphorescence is the appear ance of m.vriuds of the animal kingdom rising, fulling, playing, flashing, liv ing, dying. These luminous animalcu les for nearly 1") yeuis have been the study of naturaiists and the lascination and soleuiniallonof all who have brain enough to think. Now, (Jod who puts in his Bible nothing trivial or uselesH, calls the attention of Job, the greatest scientist of his day, to this phosphor escence, and as the letjiathan of the deep sweeps past points out the fact that "he maketh a path to shine after him." Wake Matle by a Had Nan. Is that true of us now, and will it Imj true of us when we have gone? Will there be sulwequont light or darkness? Will there bo a trail of gloom or good cheer? Can anyone between now and the next loo years sav of us truthfully as the text says of tLo leviathan of the deep, "lie maketh a path to shine after Him?" For wo are moving on. While we live in tho same house, and transact business in the same store, ami write on tho same table, and chisel in the same studio. and thrash in the same burn, and worship in tho sumo church, we are in motion ond are in many respects mov ing on, and we are not where we were ten veai-s ago, nor where we will Imj tun years hence. Moving on! Ijook at the family record,-or the almanac, or into the mirror, and see if anyone of you is where you wore. All in motion. Other feet may trip and stumble and halt, but the feet of not one moment for the lust sixty centuries lias tripped or stumbled or halted. Moving on! Society mov ing on! The world moving on! Heaven movmgon! The universe moving on! Time mov ing on! Kternity moving on! There fore it is absurd to think that wo our selvcs cun stop, as we must move with all tho rest. Are we like the creature of tho text, making our path to shino after us? It may bo a peculiar ques tion, but my text suggests it. What inlluoneo will we leavointhls world after we have gone through it? "None," answer hundreds of voices; "we are not one of the immortals. Fifty years after we are out of the worm ft will be as though we never Inhabited It." You are wrong in say ing that. I pass down through this audience and up through these gal leries, and I am looking for tome one whom I cannot find. I am looking for one who will have no Influence in this world loo years from now. But I have found the man who has the least influence, and 1 inquire into his history, and 1 tind that by a yes or a no he decided some one's eternity. In time of temptation he gave an affirmative or a negative to some temp tation which another hearing of, was induced to decide in the same way. Clear on the other side of the" next million years may be the first you hear of the long reaching influence of that yes or no, but hear of it you wili. Will that father make a path to shine after him? Will that mother make a pat h to thine after her? You will be walk ing these streets or along that country roud ax) vears from now in the char acter of your descendants. They will be affected by your eourage or your cowardice, your purity or your deprav ity, your holliness or your sin. You will make the path to shine after you or blacken after you. Why should they point out to us on some mountain two rivulets, one of which passes down into the rivers which pour out into the 1'aciflo Ocean and the other rivulet flowing down into the rivers which pass out into the Atlantic Ocean? Kvery min, every! woman, stands at a point where words j uttered, or eeds done, or prayers ! offered, decide oi)site destinies and I opposite eternities. We see a man ! planting a tree, and treading sod firmly on either side or it, and watering it in dry weather, and taking a great care in its culture, and he never plucks any fruits from its Isiugh. But his children will. We are all planting trees that will yield fruit hundreds of years after we are dead orchards of golden fruit or groves of deadly upas. I am so fascinated with the phos phorescence in the track of a ship that 1 have sometimes watched for a long while and have seen nothing on tho face of the deep but blackness. The mouth of watery chasms that looked like gaping jaws of hell. Not a spark as big us the firefly; not a white scroll of surf; not a taper to illuminate tho mighty sepulchers of dead ship: dark ness .'1,000 feet deep, and more thou sands of feet long and wide. That is the kind of wake that a bad man leaves behind him as he plows through tho ocean of this life toward the vaster ocean of the great future. The lirowth of Hln. Now, supM)se a man seated in a cor ner grocery or business ofllco among clerks give himself to jolly skepticism. Ho lauirhs ut tho Bible, makes siiort of the miracles, speaks of terdition in jokes and laughs at revivals as a frolic, and at the passage of a funeral proces sion, which always solemnizes sensible people, says, "Boys, let's take a drink." There is in that group a young man who is making a great struggle agaitut temptation and prays night and morn ing and reads his bible and is usking God for help day by day. But that guffaw against Christianity makes him lose his grip of sacred things, and he gives up Sabbath and church and morals and goes from bad to worse, till he falls under dissipations, dies in a laar house und is buried in tho let ter's field. Another young man who heard that jolly skepticism made up his mind that "it makes no difference what wo do or say, for we will all come out at last at the right pla 'e," and began asaconse quenco to purloin. Some money that came into his hunds for other.-, ho ap plied to his own uses, thinking perhaps he would make it straight some other time, and all would be well even if ho did not make it straight, lie ends in the penitentiary. That scoffer who uttered tho jokes against Christianity never realized what bad work ho was doing and he passed on through life and out of it und into a future that I urn not now goin' to depict. 1 do not propo-e with a searchlight to show the breakers of tho awful coast on which thut ship is wrecked, for my business now is to watch tho sea after tho keel has plowed it. No phosphor escence in tho wake of that hhip, but lie hind it two sonls struggling in the wave two young men destroyed by reckless skepticism, an nnillumined ocean beneath und on all sides of them. Blackness of darkness. You know what a gloriously good man Kev. John Newton was tho mo-t of his life, but Isjfore his conversion he was a very wicked sailor, and on Ixmnl the ship Harwich instilled Inli delity and vice in the mind of a young man principles which destroyed him. Aftel ward tho two met, und Newton tried to undo his bad work, but in vain. The young man became worse und worse died a prolligate, horrifying with bis profanities those who stood by him in liis last moments. Better look out what bad influence you start, for you may not be able to stop it. it does" not require very great force to ruin others. Why was it that many year.i ago a groat flood nearly de stroyed New Orleans? A crawfish hail burrowed into tho banks ol the river until tho ground was saturated and tho bunks weakened until tho Mood burst. The Mhlnlnic I'uth. But I find hero a man who starts out in life with the determination that he will never see suffering but ho will try to alleviate it: und never see discour agement but he will try to cheer it, and ne, or meet with anybody but he will try to do him good, (letting his strength from God, he starts from homo with high purpose of doing all the good ho can possibly do in one day. Whether studding behind tho counter, or talking in the business office with a lion behind his ear, or milking a burguin with a fellow trader, or out in tho fields discussing with his next neighbor tho wisest rotation of tho crops, or in tho shoomaker s shop pounding solo leather, there is some thing in his face, and In his phrase ology, and In his manner, that demon strates tlio grace of god in his heart. Ho can talk on religion without awk wardly dragging it in by tho ours. He loves God and loves the souls of all whom he meets and is Interested in their present and eternal destiny. For fifty or sixty years ho lives that kind of life and then gets through with it and goes into Heaven a ransomed soui But I am not going to describe the poi-t into which that ship has en tered. 1 am not going to describe the pilot who met him outside at the "lightship." I am not going to say anything about the crowds of friends who met him on the crystalline wharves up which he goes on steps of chrysoprases. For God in his words to Jo'j eal.s me to look at the path of foam, in the wake of that ship, and I tell you it is all a-gleam. with splendors of kindnessdone, and rolling with illumined tears that were wiped away, and a-dash with congratulations, and clear out into the horizon in all di rections iB the sparkling, flashing, bil lowing ohosphorescence of a Christian life. "He maketh a path to shine af ter him." ' And here I correct one of the mean notions which at some time takes pos session of all of us, and that is as to the brevity of human life. When I bury some very nseful man, clerical or lay, in his thirtieth or fortieth year, I say: "What a waste of energies! It was hardly wortn while for him to "get ready for Christian work, for ho had s soon to quit it." But the fact is that! may insure any man or woman who does any good on a large or small scale for a life on earth as long as the world lasts. Sickness, trolley car ac cidents, death itself, can no more de stroy his life than they can tear down one of the rings of Saturn. You can start one good word, one kind act, one cheerful smile, on a mission that will last until tho world becomes a bonfire, and out of that bla.e it will pass into tho Heavens, never to halt as long as God lives. What Ordinary Peraonn Can Io- There were in the seventeenth cen tury men and womon whoso names you never heard of who are to-day Imluenc lng schools, colleges, churches, nations. You can no more measure tho tho gra cious results of their lifetime than you could measure tho lenirth and breadth und depth of the phosphorescence last night following the ship of the White Star Line l,5uo miles out at sea. How the courage and consecration of others inspire us to follow, as ageneral in the American army, cool amid tho Hying bullets, inspired a trembling so!dier, who said afterward, "I was nearly scared to dcatn, but I saw the old man's white mustache over his shoul der and went on." Aye, we are afl following sonioliody either in right or wrong directions A few days ago I stood beside the garlanded casket of a gospel minister, and in my remarks had occasion to re call a snowy night in a farm house whon I was a loy and an evangelist spending anight at my father's house, who said something si) tender and beautiful and impressive that it led me into the king dom of God and decided my destiny for this world and tho next. You will, be fore twenty-four hours go by, meet some man or woman with a big pack of euro und trouble, and you may say someihimg to him or her that will en dure until l his world shall have been so far lost in the oast that nothing but the stretch of angelic memory will be ablo to realize that it over existed ut all. I am not talking of remarkable men und women, but of what ordinary folks can do. I am not speaking of the phos phorescence in the wake of a Cam pania, but of the phosphorescence ia tho track of a Newfoundland fishing smack. God makes thunderbolts out of shirks, and out of the small words and deeds of a small life he can launch a power that will Hash and burn und thunder through the eternities. How do you like this prolongation of your earthly life by deathless in fluence? Many a bubo that died at it months of ago by tho anxiety created in tho parent's heart to meetthatchild in realms seraphic is living yet in the transformed heart and life of those parents and will live on forever in the history of thut family. If this be tho opportunity of ordinary souls, what is the opportunity of those who huve especial Mitel lectuul or social or mo netary equipment? Hav e you any arithmetic capable of estimating tho iulluenco of our good and gracious friend who a few days ago went up to rest - George W. Childs of I'hiladel hiu? From a newspajsir that was printed for .10 years without one word of dcfam ition or scurrility or scandal, and putting chief emphasis on virtue and charity and clean intelli gence, ho reaped u fortune for himself and then distributed a vast amount of it among tho pour und struggling, put ting his invalid and aged reiorters on Mansions, until his name stands every where for largo lioartedness and sym pathy and help und highest stylo of Christian gentleman. In nri era which had in the chairs of its journalism a Horace Greeley, and u Henry J. Huymond, und a James Gordon Bennett, and un Krastus Brooks, and a George William Curtis, und a Irenueus Prime, none of them will bo longer re mcmlierol than George VV. Childs. Stuying away from the unveiling of the" monument ho had reared at largo expense in our Greenwood in memory of Professor Proctor, tho astronomer, lost I should say something in praise of the man who hud paid for tho monu ment. By all acknowledged a repre sentative of the highest American ournalism. If you would calculate his influence for good,' you must count how many sheets of his newspapers have leen published in tho last quarter of a cen tury, und how many people huvo road them, und the effect, not only noon those readers, but upon all whom tfiey shall influence for all time, while you ttid to all that tho work of the churches ho help build and of tho lnstitntions.of mercy ho holpcd found. Better givo up before you start tho measuring of tho phosphorescence in tho wake of that ship of the Celestial lino; Who can toll tho post mortem inlluenco of a Savonarola, a Winkolrled, a Guten berg, a Marllwrough, a Decatur, a Toussaint, a Bolivar, a Clarkson, a Holier t ltaikes, a Harlan Page, who had 12.') Sabbath scholars, M of whom became Christians, and six of them ministers of the gospel. Let Tour Light Shine. But murk you that the phosphores cence has a glow that the night mo nopolizes, and I ask you not only what kind of intiuence you are going to leave In the world as you pass through, it, but what light are you going to throw across the world's night of sin and sorrow? People who are sailing1 on smooth sea and at noon do not need much sympathy, but what are you go ing to do for people In the night of misfortune? Will you drop on them shadow, or will you kindle for them phosphorescence? At this moment there are more peo ple crying than laughing, more people on the round world this moment hun gry than well fed, more households be reft than homes unbroken. What are you going to do about it? "Well," says yonder soul, "I would like to do something toward illumining the great ocean of human wretchedness, but I cannot do much." Can you do as much as' one of the phosphori in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, creatures smaller than theX)in of a sharp pin? "Oh. yes," you say. Then do that. Shine! Stand before the looking glass and experiment to see if you ennot get tiiatscowl of your forehead, that peevish look out of your lips. Have at least one bright ribiion in your bonnet. Embroider at least one white cord somewhere in the mid night of your apparel. Do not any longer impersonate a funeral. Shine! Do say something cheerful about so ciety and about the world. Put a few drops of Heaven into yo ir disposition. Once in awhile substitute a sweet orange for a sour lemon. Kemembc r that pessimism is blas phemy and that optimism is Christi anity. Throw some light on the night ocean. If you cannot be a lantern swinging in tho rigging, be ono of the tinv phosphori back of tho keel Shine! "Let yo ir light so shine bo fore men that others seeing your good works may glorify your Father which is in Heaven." Make one person happy every day, and do that for twenty years, and you will have made 7, .'too happy. You know a man who has lost all his property by an unfortunate investment or by put ting his name on tho back of a friend's note. After you have taken a brief nap, which every man and woman is entitled to on a Sunday afternoon, go and cheer up that man. You can, if God helps you, say something t hat will do him good after lioth of you have been dead a thousand years. Shine! You know of a family with a bod lioy who has ran away from home. Go liefore night and tell that father and mother the parable of the prodigal sun, and that some of the illustrious and useful men now Inchurch ond State had a silly passage in their lives and ran away from home. Shino! You know of a family that has lost a child. and the silence of t se nursery glooms the whole house from cellar to garret. Go before night and tell them how npch thut Ciiild hag happily escaped, since the most prosperous life on earth is a struggle. Shino. You know of some invalid who is dying for lack of an appetite. She cannot get well because she can not eat. Broil a chicken and take it to her before night and cheat her poor appetite into keen relislr. Shine! You know of somo ono who likes you, and you like him, and he ought to be a Christian. Go tell him what religion has done for you, and ask him if you can pray for him. 'the Failure of Knloify. Shine! Oh, for a disposition so charged with sweetness and light that we cannot help .nit shine! Kemember if you cannot be a leviathan lashing tho ocean imo fury you cun be one of the phosphori, doing your part toward making a path of phosphorescence. Then 1 will toll you what impression you w'll leuvo us you pass through this life and after you are gone. 1 will tell you to your face and not leave it for the minister who officiates at your ob 80 plies. The failure in all eulogium of tho de parted is that they cannot hear it. All hear it except tho one most interested. Tim, in substance, is what I or somo ono else will suy of you on such un oc cusion: "Wo gather for offices of re spect to this departed ono. it is im possible to tell how many tears he wiped away, how many burdens he lifted, or how many souls he was, under God, instrumental in saving. His inlluenco will never cease. We are all bett r for having known him. "That pillow of (lowers on the casket was presented oy his babbath school ciass.tillof whom he brought to Christ. That cross of Mowers at tho head was presented by the orphan asylum which he befriended. Those three single flowers - ono was sent by a poor woman for whom ho bought a ton of coal, and ono was by a waif of the street wh im ho rescued through tho midnight, mis sion, and tho other was from the pr.son coll which he had often visited to incourago repentance in a young man who had done wrong. "Tlioso three loose llowers mean quite as much us the costly garlands now breathing their aroma through this saddened homo crowded with sym pathizers. 'Blessed are the dead who die in tho Lord. They rest from their lalsirs, and their works do follow them." Or if it should bo tho more solemn burial at sea, let it be after tho sun has gone done, and tho captain bus road tho appropriate liturgy, and the ship's boll has tolled, und you are let down from tho stern of tho vessel into the resplendent, phoophoresconro at the wake of the ship. Thon let some ono say, in tho wrods of my text, "He maketh a pnth to shine al'tor him." Onk way of being unfair Is to com pel a merchant to buy tickets you are selling because you trade with him. When a man gives his boys skates for Christmas h s wlfo says: "You don't care if they do get drowned." Heavy plaid shawls and fur jackets are being used everywhere by iuoths THE COMMERCIAL BANK. ESTABLISHED 1868.1 Harrison, B. B. Bowstkr, President. D. H. GRISWOLD, Cashier. AUTHORIZED CAPITAL $50 000. Transacts a General CORRESPONDENTS: Akteioah Exchange National Bank, New York, Ui.ted States National Bank. Omaha, First National Bank, Chadrot. Interest Paid on Time Deposits. tVDRAFTS SOLD ON ALL PABTS OF EUROPE. THE PIONEER Pharmacy, J. E. PHINNEY, Proprietor. Pure Drugs, Medicines, Paints, Oils and Varnishes. WARTISTS' MATERIAL. School Supplies. Prescriptions Carefully Compounded Day or Night. SILICONS & SMILEY, Harrison, Nebraska, Real Estate Agents, Have a number of bargains in choice land in Sioux county. Parties desiring to buy or sell real estate should not fail to call on them. School leased, taxes paid for non-residents; farms rented, ota CORRESPONDENTS SOLICITED. Nebraska. C. F. Corro, Vice-Prwtfwi Banking Business. IVBBTJSHES. Lands 4 '5